


Over the Mountains and Through the Woods (To Grandmother's House We Go)

by vviintersoldiier



Category: Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Powers, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Established Relationship, Flashbacks, Gone very wrong, Happy Ending, Homophobia, M/M, Marriage Proposal, Meeting the Parents, Mild Gore, Murder, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Supernatural Elements, Violence, creepy grandmas, doesnt really focus on their relationship but it DOES heavily feature them as a couple, if that makes sense, it definitely doesnt but oh well, steve is a dumbass
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-11
Updated: 2019-02-11
Packaged: 2019-10-26 11:09:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17744807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vviintersoldiier/pseuds/vviintersoldiier
Summary: Steve and James get engaged. Steve takes James to see his grandmother. Dinner doesn't go quite as planned.





	Over the Mountains and Through the Woods (To Grandmother's House We Go)

**Author's Note:**

> hey y'all! i'm not very good at writing but i wrote the skeleton to this fic for an assignment way too many years ago, and i really didnt want to see her stay in my google docs only to be read by my slightly homophobic teacher and me :D
> 
> anyway! all mistakes are my own because i was too afraid to let my group chat look at this!
> 
> you can find me at vviintersoldiier on tumblr :)

“James, it’s been two years. You’re the love of my life, and I couldn’t imagine being in this world without you anymore. You light up the dark in me like you’re the sun, especially with your dumb jokes.  _ God,  _ your jokes, I swear, even when they’re the worst thing I’ve ever heard, just your face after you make it makes me laugh. I love you so much. Things won’t always be great, but I know we can do it, I know we can make it,” Steve says, with glassy eyes and a small smile, getting down on one knee. “Will you marry me?” 

 

Angling his body toward Steve, who was at the edge of the table, James used his hand to wipe away a tear, smiling to the point his face hurt. Slowly, he nods his head and cups Steve’s face, looking down at him with an adoring gaze. While Steve leaned up, James gently pulled his face toward himself and gave him a loving kiss. After they broke away from each other, they looked around at the life they had already created together in their home. 

 

They owned an apartment together, with pictures of their lives and family dispersed all around them. James looks to a specific photograph in particular, of a small woman with light blonde hair and eyes that shone as bright as Steve’s.

 

“Do you think your mother would have liked me? If you and I had met when we were kids?”

 

“Of course, hun. You’re the love of my life, which is reason enough for her,” Steve says, abandoning his position on the dining room floor in favor of sitting next to James. “She would have adored you. You’re just her type - a tall, brooding idiot. After raising a scrappy, chronically-ill, antisocial kid, I think she would love someone who could make a good man outta me.”

 

“I wish I could have met her,” James says, looking forlorn. “I wish I could have met the woman who made you exist in this world at the same time as me. And  _ shh,  _ let me be sappy. You  _ literally  _ just proposed in the sappiest way possible.” The blond looks over to James, giving him a fond glance, intertwining their hands, and resting his head on the brunet’s shoulder.

 

“You know…” Steve hesitates, looking at a photo of an older woman with the same golden hair that appears to be a Grant family trademark, with her holding a young Steve in her arms. “It’s never too late. My grandmother  _ did  _ raise me from the minute my mom passed. In a way, you would be meeting her, considering she raised two generations of the Rogers.”

 

“Come to think of it, why haven’t I met her yet? Are you not out to them yet?”

 

“No! I mean, sort of? I think they know? I never really brought anyone home, other than Peggy. It’s just… intimidating bringing someone home, y’know?” 

 

“Hun, it’s alright. I get it. I want to meet her and your grandfather. When do we wanna do this?”

 

“As soon as possible. I’ll call her tonight.”

 

~*~

 

_ “Honey, where are you? Joseph!,” Sarah yells out, frantically searching through her mother’s dimly lit house. “Joseph, there’s someone in the house! Please, honey, just tell me Steve is safe!”  _

 

_ “Sarah? Sarah! Is that you? Get out! It’s not safe!” Joseph screams out to his sobbing wife. _

 

_ “Joe, who’s there? Is Steve with you?  _ Please  _ tell me he’s with you!” _

 

_ “Sar… I thought he was with you. You need to leave, now.” _

 

_ “No! Joe, he’s our baby boy, I’m not leaving without him!” _

 

_ “You have to! I don’t know who’s here and I don’t know how dangerous they are. Promise me you’ll keep our son safe, Sarah. I’m going downstairs now. I love you.” _

 

_ As Joseph cautiously descended the staircase, he heard a distant clanking coming from the kitchen. While slowly creeping down the stairs, a step let out a loud, deep creak. Suddenly, the clanking noise from the kitchen stopped, and heavy footsteps were headed toward Joseph’s location. _

 

~*~

 

Pacing around the living room, Steve grabs his phone from his back pocket and dials a familiar number. 

 

“Hey, Nana. How’s it going?”

 

“Stevie!,” Nana exclaims, “It’s been so long, how are you? Have you eaten already? I can’t have you getting skinny again, my boy.”

 

“Yeah, yeah, Nana. I just ate with J-,” 

 

“Jay? Who is that, honey? Did you go out with a girl? I know Peggy broke your heart, but you can’t let that eat you up forever. You’re a handsome young man, one that deserves to get some-”

 

“ _ Nana! _ And maybe? That’s what I was calling about, actually. I need to introduce you to somebody. He’s really important to me.”

 

“He? Alright, but we’ll be talking about that later. Steven, you bring him over tomorrow night. I know where you live, young man. I’m  _ not  _ afraid to drive three hours to Brooklyn to make sure you’re fed and I’m not forgotten. 7 o'clock sharp, got it?”

 

“Yes, Nana,” Steve groans, “we will be there. 7 o’clock sharp. I love you!”

 

“I love you too, Stevie.”

 

~*~

 

_ The footsteps became lighter as they crept closer to where Joseph was standing. The villa’s floorboards had never sounded so old and so loud. He heard a light rapping on the side of the wooden staircase, and a shiver ran through his entire body, his hair standing up in the back of his neck.  _ This is how I’m going to die,  _ he thinks to himself. Not with a bang, nor with a shout, but out of fear. He can’t leave his wife or his baby with this… demon? Intruder? Murderer?  _

 

_ He continued to creep down the staircase, his heart hammering in his chest. _

 

_ For Sarah. For Steve. _

 

~*~

 

While driving down the I-90 to Boston, Steve noticed James’ breathing beginning to change. The closer they got, the less he would point random landmarks out, and the more he would let out small, shaky breaths. Eventually, after passing the Massachusetts state line, James finally spoke.

 

“Hey, Steve?”

 

“Yeah, J?”

 

“What are your grandparents like?” James asks, a slight nervous shake entering his voice.

 

“They’re amazing. My grandfather served in the 107th back in World War II, which is actually how he and my grandmother met. She was a nurse back on camp and he was a soldier that conveniently got sick pretty often,” Steve reminisces, recalling the stories of the war he heard from his grandfather and quirky romantic stories from his grandmother.

 

“No way! The 107th? My grandfather served in that regiment too! The great Buchanan Barnes.”

 

“Is that where you get your middle name from? If it helps, I got named after mine, too. The great Steven Grant line will always live on. He’s a great man. If anything were to happen to his family, God forbid, going to Hell would be the most generous way out.”

 

“Sounds like someone else I know,” James says with a smirk, looking from the passenger side window to Steve’s chiseled face. “What about your grandma? What’s she like?”

 

“That’s… that’s a good question. She’s kind and caring when you get to know her. That’s why it’s taken me two years to introduce you two. She’s not exactly a fan of our kind of relationship.”

 

“She knows about us, though? Right? So it shouldn’t be a huge deal, it’s not like I’m a surprise or anything. You said that they knew you were with someone,” James says with a furrow in his brow.

 

“They know I met someone and that they’re a man, but… I never actually mentioned you?”

 

“ _ Steven. Grant.  _ I swear to God. It’s been two years. We’re getting married. We live together. How did I not wind up in a conversation?”

 

“Honestly? I’m not out. And when you and I started getting serious, my grandfather had a heart attack. I didn’t need to give my grandmother one as well. I know now how stupid that was of me, but you’ve been out and proud since you popped out of your mother. It’s hard.”

 

“You’re lucky I love you so much. I swear to the Gods, Stevie, I don’t know what to do with you. But since you’re the idiot who didn’t tell his grandmother  _ that raised him  _ about your fiancé, you get to make the cover story. Because I’m a great fiancé. And also because I may be a little intimidated by all this,” James says, running out of breath. He was on the verge of a full-blown panic attack, which Steve knew were catastrophic to his mental health. 

 

“I’ll come clean. My grandfather will understand. And I know my grandmother will too,” Steve admits, grabbing James’ left land and pressing his lips to the back of it. “We’ll get through this. To the end of the line.”

 

“To the end of the line.”

 

_ ~*~ _

 

_ The closer to the bottom of the stairs Joseph got, the farther away his sanity went. Looking to the direction all of the noises were erupting from, he saw nothing. Squinting his eyes, he could see a faint dark shadow moving around the common area before the doorway. As the shadow was spotted, a loud shrieking noise starting in his head overwhelmed his senses - one he couldn’t figure out the location of. _

 

_ Glancing to his left, he finds Sarah holding their son. Both her and the baby are sobbing, screaming at the body on the floor. His body. _

 

~*~

 

After driving over three hours in rush hour traffic, Steve sighs with a breath of relief when he sees the grand villa coming into his line of sight. The villa was in the middle of two towns in Massachusetts, with a large plot of land and no neighbors to be found for miles. The old building had to have been there for at least a hundred years, with paint chipping off of the exterior and rust around the edges of window sills. The landscaping, however, was beautiful to anyone’s standards, with flowers in full bloom, green grass, and monstrous trees. 

 

“Jay, we’re here. You ready?” Steve asks, eyeing James warily, regretting his choices from years ago. 

 

James nods his head and exits the car. Once they’re both out and heading toward the doorway, James offers his hand to Steve. He takes it and laces their fingers together as they walk to the door.

 

Steve knocks in a particular pattern, one he and his grandmother used as a secret code when he was younger. As the door opens, an old woman with warm blonde hair and dull blue eyes greets them.

 

“Stevie! I was just getting ready to take dinner out of the oven.” She exclaims, hugging Steve with more strength than even Steve could fathom having.

 

“Of course, Nana. you really think I would ditch my old lady? Uh-uh, you can’t get rid of me that easily. Speaking of permanence, this is James. Barnes.” Steve says, gesturing to James with a soft look in his eyes.

 

“Hi! Thank you for having me over, ma’am. I see where Steve gets his looks from.” James says coyly. “You don’t look a day over seventy!”

 

“I wasn’t aware that you brought company,” she says distastefully, giving James a disrespectful once-over.

 

“We talked about it over the phone just last night, Nana. Do you not remember us talking about how I had someone you needed to meet?”

 

Changing the subject, she switches her gaze back to Steve, her eyes lighting up once again. “So! Let’s get you boys set up in your rooms-”

 

“Rooms? Nana, we’re big boys, we can stay together,” Steve cuts in.

 

“Not in this house. Unless you two would like to tell me you got married, you stay in separate rooms,” Nana says with a final tone.

 

She leads the two men along the dark wooden staircase into a dimly-lit hallway containing six doors. “James, you’ll be staying in here,” she says, pointing to the second door on the left. “Stevie, you’ll be in your usual room. If you need me, I’ll be downstairs in the kitchen. Don’t take too long.” She gives them a stern look, raising a thin eyebrow to finalize her statement.

 

~*~

 

_ “Sarah! Steve! Why are you still here? Leave! Get out! It’s not safe here!” Joseph screams, to no avail. Either Sarah is ignoring him, or something is wrong with him. He looks back down at a figure that looks exactly like him, from the jawline to the birthmark on his neck. Blood is pouring out of his mouth, creating a grotesque scene in front of his family. _

 

_ “Sarah, can you hear me?,” he says, walking towards the woman, “Sarah!” _

 

_ He can hear her mumbling to herself, able to pick out certain words along the lines of: “He’s dead, Stevie.” _

 

_ “I’m right here! I’m alive! I’m not sure for how long, there’s something in this house -” _

 

_ Sarah walks toward the body on the ground and kneels down, sobbing and silently screaming alongside her child.  _

 

_ Suddenly, Joseph sees a human-like figure with ghostly white skin and haunting black eyes.  _

 

~*~

 

When the two men were done unpacking upstairs, they walked down to the kitchen together. Steve and James start to set the table together when Nana brings out a feast. 

 

“Hey, Nana, where is grandpa? I haven’t seen him at all since we got here.”

 

“He’s around. James, pass the pork chops,” Nana says shortly. As James hands her the serving tray full of meat, his grip loosens and the contents of the tray flew onto the table and Nana’s body. 

 

“Steve, honey, can you grab me a shirt from my closet? Since your boy toy over here doesn’t know how to practice table manners.” 

 

Nodding his head, Steve slowly backs away from the table and heads upstairs, leaving James apologizing profusely to his grandmother. When opening his Nana’s bedroom door, a foul stench seeps into his nose. Squinting his eyes and holding his breath, he slides open her closet door. Without any direct light, it was hard to make out what was hiding in there. 

 

Steve moves towards the light switch and turns it on, promptly making the room light up with a dim yellow lamp on the opposite side of the room. As he walked back toward the closet, he let out a hysterical scream. 

 

~*~

 

_ The creature was standing over Sarah and Steve, holding out its long, gruesome claws over his wife’s head. Screaming out, Joseph attempted to stop the creature from killing the two things in life that mattered to him most, but it was too late.  _

 

_ His wife was gone. The creature took Steve.  _

 

~*~

 

Running out of the room and down the stairs, he heads straight to the dining room. “Nana,” he says, tears in his eyes and a scared tinge in his voice, “can you tell me why grandpa is dead in your closet with half of his limbs missing?”

 

“Stop asking questions, Steven.”

 

“I think I have the right to! I just saw my grandfather dead and lying in a pool of his own blood in my grandmother’s closet with both of his legs gone. When did this happen? Did you know?” Steve says, his voice shaking with emotion and tears collecting in the corner of his eyes. James comes behind Steve, rubbing his back and making quiet  _ shh- _ ing noises. 

 

“ _ I told you to stop asking questions!,”  _ Nana screeches, suddenly morphing into a towering ghostly figure with demonic black eyes. She disappears out of Steve and James’ sight, causing them to worry further. 

 

“Jay, we’re getting out of here, now. Grab my hand,” Steve hurriedly says while the creature is hidden. They run through the door, almost tripping on the steps on the porch. 

 

As they pull up to their car and attempt to open the doors, James asks, “Steve, do you have the keys?”

 

“Shit! No! They’re upstairs with the rest of my stuff.”

 

The creature appears in front of the villa’s gate, tweaking its neck and unleashing its claws. “ _ Steven. You’re going to be just as weak as your father was, aren’t you? Tough words from weak people.” _

 

“Steve, baby, it’s just trying to get in your head. We need to get out of here. Focus!”

 

Trying to focus on James’ voice, Steve turns his back on the monster and runs for the car. He feels the wind shift as the creature lunges toward them, and yells out to his  fiancé . “Get into the car! I’ll try to hold it off! As soon as you get in,  _ leave, _ baby! Floor it!”

 

“No! Not without you!” James screams, eyeing the creature’s actions with his back toward their car. “‘Til the end of the line, Stevie,” he adds with a broken sob, watching as Steve grabs a shovel from the front gate’s garden.

 

“‘Til the end of the-” Steve breaks off, dodging as the creature uses its claws to gash into the side of his head, nearly piercing through his forehead, “line.” He falls with a  _ thud _ , the creature closely following his body to the ground, grabbing his legs and pulling him up until he is completely off the ground upside down. The shovel Steve had falls to the grass below him as he loses his grip, where James quickly picks it back up and hits the creature’s hand.

 

Its shrieks in pain as one of its claws breaks off and drops to the grass, but continues to pull Steve up to its head, opening its mouth wide to reveal sharp, bloody teeth. 

 

“Steve,  _ no! _ ” James screams, his voice breaking. He tries to hit the creature again, but it seemed to have sensed his intentions and bats him aside, sending him flying into the brick of the front gate. With a grunt, James gets back up, determined to free his  fiancé and to get home, somewhere safe and far away from this monstrosity of a supernatural creature. Picking up the shovel, dented from breaking the creature’s claw, James limps to the ghostly figure.

 

He gives himself a moment to size-up what kind of creature it is. He notes that it has to be at least 13 feet tall, considering it makes Steve’s 6’5” look tiny in comparison. It has a dampened white clothing on its terrifyingly pale, gray, and bumpy body, with long and frizzy off-white hair, similar to Steve’s grandmother’s. Its eyes are large and pure black, the kind that Steve could only wish for when painting. The most terrifying features are its claws, long, girthy, and an off-putting moldy green color, and its teeth, which are razor-sharp and in an abundance. 

 

Approaching it from the back, James grips the shovel with white knuckles and holds it like a baseball bat, getting ready for the perfect moment to strike. It puts Steve back down on the ground, but is now hovering over Steve’s limp but still alive body. He can hear Steve’s heavy breathing and feels an ache in his chest - Steve is having an asthma attack. The creature seems to notice the change in Steve’s breathing as well, as its body morphs to something vaguely human, the facade changing to that of Steve’s grandmother. 

 

“Steven, darling. I wish it didn’t have to come to this. But there is something about the  _ Rogers,”  _ said with a disgusted tone, “bloodline that brings out the worst in me. You see, your father wouldn’t leave anything  _ wrong _ in the house alone. I had no peace in my own home! From someone who wasn’t even family! And then your grandfather decided to turn his back on me too! After being married 60 years, I believed I deserved better. You understand now, right, my love? They couldn’t accept me anymore, and I couldn’t move on. Call it survivor’s guilt, Stevie.”

 

~*~

 

_ Joseph never stopped looking for Sarah and Steve in his post-mortem wake. His body decayed on the property, but his ghost-like afterlife state has yet to do the same. Part of him wants to believe that it’s because God needs him to look for his son and wife, and that only he could be trusted with such a task. He learned to give up faith quickly. _

 

_ Years later, however, still haunting the villa where he saw his child and wife die, there were people in the villa again.  _

 

_ Sarah’s mother had left the villa for years after the death of her daughter and grandson, presumably to mourn. But when she returned, she had what looked to be a 3-year-old boy with shiny golden hair and the brightest blue eyes - almost a carbon copy of his wife’s. She called him Steve. After that day, Joseph learned how to gain faith again and swore he would never leave his son’s side. _

 

~*~

 

Spluttering blood from his mouth and taking one long and deep breath, coughing immediately after, Steve says, “What the fuck do you mean? Who are you? What have you  _ done? _ What have  _ I _ done?”

 

The creature takes his words in offense, and despite being in a more human-like body, uses its claws to shallowly into Steve’s chest. “What do you mean, what have  _ I _ done? Do you not listen to me, boy? I’m preserving my  _ bloodline _ , Steven! I trusted that you would find a suitable host for  тварь, and then you bring-” it stops suddenly, as it searches for James’, what it presumed to be, dead body. When it couldn’t see his body against the brick, only the blood from the back of his head leaving red splotches on the wall, its eyes widened and a loud, piercing scream came from its mouth.

 

~*~

 

_ Steve’s grandmother never let Steve leave the villa. She homeschooled him from kindergarten to his last year of high school. She ordered groceries and clothes through a distant neighbor who had heard of the tragedy of years before. But she and Steve never left the villa.  _

 

_ Until one day, they had a fight. And Steve left. _

 

_ Joseph swore he would never leave Steve’s side. But he couldn’t leave the villa. _

 

_ And then Steve came back. With someone else. _

 

~*~

 

He doesn’t stop hitting the creature until he flattens its skull. James stands behind the now frail-looking creature, bloody shovel in hand. His eyes are glassy, skin pale, but most of all, he doesn’t look like his normal self to Steve. It’s almost like his persona changed from someone frightened for their fiance’s life to that of a worried paternal gaze. His eyes are the wrong color, too. They aren’t his Jay’s slate grey eyes - they’re bright blue, like water in Greece. Steve knows these eyes, but he doesn’t know how. His dad died when he was a baby, and his mother died when he was three.  _ How _ could James have  _ those _ eyes?

 

“Steve, baby, oh my Gods-” James whimpers, falling to his knees and crawling over the creature to get to Steve. “I’m so sorry, baby, Stevie I’m so sorry,” he continues to mumble, this time stroking the not bloodied side of Steve’s head, pulling him tightly into his chest. 

 

Still under a daze, Steve blearily looks up to his fiance’s face. “Who are you?”

 

“I’m sorry, Steven. But I can’t - I can’t seem to say it. I’m your f-” he cuts off suddenly, gasping for air.

 

“James!” Steve cries out, cupping James’ face, trying to steady him. “No, no, no, no-”

 

After a moment, James’ body shudders and his eyes close, and open to the familiar cool gray that Steve loves. He studies his face noticing that James seems shell-shocked, but not because he almost saw the love his life die, but because… he was a passenger in his own body.

 

“Stevie… are you okay? Is it- is it dead?” 

 

“I think so, Jay. I think so. Let’s get out of here before we find out it’s not.”

 

“Good plan.” James then lifts himself to a crouch and helps Steve get up. Steve has to carry most of James’ weight, as the pain of his injuries from being thrown into a brick wall have caught up to him. They stumble to their car, remembering that they don’t have the keys. James breaks the back row side window and tugs the lock up on the driver’s side, successfully unlocking the car.

 

“Hey, you wouldn’t happen to know how to hotwire a car, would you?” James asks.

 

“I- I can confidently say that I can’t, considering I don’t even have a driver’s license.”

 

“Shit, okay. I need to run inside and get the keys, Stevie. I’m gonna leave the shovel with yo-” he abruptly ends. The car keys seemed to appear out of mid-air, as if being tossed casually by a friend. After the night both men had, they weren’t going to question  _ how _ or  _ why, _ but rather just open the front gate and floor it out of the villa.

 

“We made it, Stevie.”


End file.
